Hey there! Today I want to talk to you about “Meal Prepping”. Like clean eating, meal prepping is very popular right now because of the great advantages it offers to leading and maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
What is it? It’s planning ahead and preparing with time your meals for the week.
How is it done? By designing a weekly menu with breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks, and preparing the meals or ingredients for that menu.
When? Planning your menu with the list of ingredients and doing your shopping on Saturday or Sunday to start your meal prepping that same Sunday or Monday.
Here's an example:
First, you plan a balanced and healthy menu in accordance with your diet.
After that, you make the list of ingredients of the menu, and go grocery shopping.
Finally, you meal prep following the menu. Decide which foods can be prepared with time, which foods do you prefer to just clean and chop, which food can wait, etc.
Suppose this following menu is your meal plan for the week:
A breakfast such as 2 pieces of toast with strawberries and almond butter or one egg wrap with vegetables in a whole wheat tortilla and a fresh juice. Snacks like celery sticks with peanut butter, a cup of grapes or carrots with hummus. Lunches and dinners like salads or one portion of protein accompanied by vegetables and a complex carbohydrate.
How would you do this meal prep?
If you're going to eat the salads from Monday through Friday, use 5 air-tight containers to store the prepared salads without dressing. Put the dressing on your salad the day you are going to eat it.
Wash and cut the celery sticks and leave them in a container for easy access. Do the same with the grapes and carrots that will serve snacks.
Wash and cut the vegetables that you'll use to make your egg wrap and prepare a big batch of oven roasted vegetables to accompany your dinners.
Wash and cut the ingredients for your juice. Put them in a zip-lock bag inside the freezer. The day you want to drink the juice, simply take a bag, pour the ingredients into the blender and add water.
Here are my favorite tips:
- Plan a menu of meals for the week with the list of ingredients.
- Plan meals with similar ingredients to save time and money.
- Go grocery shopping on a Saturday or Sunday to prepare the meals or let the ingredients ready. This way it’s easier to eat healthy all week.
- Have or buy a good set of containers.
- Wash, chop and store fruits and vegetables.
- Prepare full meals, such as a salad, or useful ingredients such as vegetables for an omelette, and store them in airtight container inside the refrigerator.
- Have a plan of action for meal prepping, such as deciding what to do first, what to do while some ingredients are cooking, etc.
- Make meal prepping fun by listening to your favorite music or have movie or tv show playing in the background.
* IMPORTANT: Remember to research and read about how much time you can keep foods inside the refrigerator and freezer. You can plan and prepare meals for the week but it’s important to always pay attention to the expiration date of the ingredients.